After Bloody Elbow posted the story, Johnson apologized on his Facebook page and absolved himself of guilt. He wrote the following:

I want to apologize to everybody for my language yesterday. It really sux being accused of something I didn’t do. So plz forgive my reaction to the whole situation. My day will come that I can prove I’m innocent. Thank you for the support! Without the fans and my close friends/family I wouldn’t be able to function. I love you all….

In case you didn’t read the account of Johnson’s alleged abuse on Bloody Elbow, here’s the rundown:

Thiago Silva was released from his UFC contract on Feb. 7 due to his arrest by police in South Florida. The charges against Silva were dropped by the Broward County District Attorney’s office and Silva was re-signed to the UFC earlier this month. Based on new information received today in the form of video and audio evidence, Silva has been terminated from his UFC contract.

And yes, that’s the entire statement. So once again, we’ll fill in the blanks. Earlier today, Globo.com published a video provided by Thiago Silva’s ex-wife, which shows an agitated Silva carrying a gun and making paranoid accusations about Thaysa “hiding a guy up there.” BloodyElbow has a translation of the exchange, as well as another video that allegedly shows Silva under the influence of cocaine.

In other words: Embarrassing video evidence needed to go public before the UFC decided to do the right thing. Huh. Why does that sound familiar?

UFC light-heavyweight contender Anthony Johnson has been placed on an indefinite suspension, following new abuse allegations from the mother of his children. Here’s the vague, detail-free official statement via UFC.com:

We are aware of the situation involving Anthony Johnson. As a result, we are suspending him indefinitely. We are using a third-party law firm to conduct a formal investigation and once we have more information, we’ll determine whether further course of action is necessary.

— Two years ago, Anthony Johnson allegedly punched the mother of two of his children in the face, knocking out two of her teeth. The incident took place at the victim’s place of employment, a supplement store. The victim claims she has security footage of the incident in her possession.

— The victim says that Johnson talked her out of pressing charges at the time. Since then, the victim has regularly received threatening calls and text messages, which she believes have been coming from Johnson’s friends.

The feared Dutch striker/laughable Dutch grappler made his return to the American MMA scene tonight in the main event of Bellator 125. He faced off against Bellator mainstay and respected striker Doug Marshall.

If not for the PED controversies that have plagued him since 2006, Vitor Belfort would be one of the most inspirational figures in MMA history. We’re talking about a fighter who picked himself up after each high-profile defeat and kept clawing his way forward, who started his career as a young destroyer at heavyweight, then reinvented himself as a light-heavyweight when that didn’t work out, then reinvented himself as a middleweight when that didn’t work out, then floated anywhere between 185 and 205 pounds depending on what the moment called for.

This December, after more than 18 years in the sport (!), the 37-year-old Belfort will challenge Chris Weidman in a middleweight title fight at UFC 181. The fight represents yet another career peak for Belfort, and will define his third stint in the UFC, which began five years ago today — September 19th, 2009 — when Belfort TKO’d Rich Franklin at UFC 103.

Heading into the fight, Belfort was enjoying the kind of momentum that had been rare in his career. Following his decision loss to Dan Henderson (and positive steroid test) at PRIDE 32, Belfort won a pair of fights under the Cage Rage banner — becoming the promotion’s light-heavyweight champion in the process — then dropped to middleweight and brutally KO’d Terry Martin and Matt Lindland in Affliction. Shortly after Affliction’s uglydemise, the UFC re-signed Belfort and booked him for a 195-pound catchweight fight against former middleweight champ Rich Franklin, who had gone back up to compete at light-heavyweight and 195 lbs. (aka “Franklinweight”) since his second loss to Anderson Silva. Fun fact from the UFC 103 wiki page:

It was announced on July 20, 2009 that Rich Franklin would headline UFC 103 against Dan Henderson. It was then announced on July 31, 2009 that fans were not happy with the announced headliner of Henderson-Franklin 2 so they changed the main event to feature Rich Franklin vs. Vitor Belfort. “Fans didn’t like it, so we changed it,” White said.

I only vaguely remember this moment in UFC history where fan sentiment could actually influence which fights get made. Now, we pretty much have to eat what they give us.

Mark Hunthad us nervous yesterday, but he — and everyone else — successfully made weight earlier today for UFC Fight Night 52 in Saitama, Japan. Hunt hit the scales at 264 pounds, which means he cut a full twenty pounds in the 24 hours prior to weigh-ins. (Our sources tell us that he’s already rehydrated up to 385.)

Also, Rin Nakai walked to the scale in some sort of samurai-hooker costume, then stripped it off to reveal an American flag/Superman bikini top. I was hoping for something tentacle-related, but whaddya gonna do. Full “Hunt vs. Nelson” weigh-in results are below…